The Science of Symmetry
by Jeune Fille Ennuye
Summary: Raven awoke in a room she had never seen before. She was lying on a fourposter bed in the center of a small and simple bedroom. Its four white walls were covered with maps of Jump City, building plans, and blueprints... all covered in X's.
1. Chapter 1

Raven awoke in a room she had never seen before. She was lying on a comfortable but foreign four-poster bed in the center of a small and simple bedroom. Its four white walls were covered with maps of Jump City, building plans, and blueprints, all carefully marked in pen with circles, notes, and X's. There were a lot of X's. To her left, a window looked out on what she assumed was Jump City, although the blinds were shut. A door on the wall opposite her was half open, light from the hallway beyond it spilling into the room. She automatically called upon her powers to open the door the rest of the way, but nothing happened. Slightly worried, she tried to sit up to try to meditate, but found herself inexplicably exhausted, hardly able to even clench her hands into fists.

"Hey, anyone there? I'm awake!" Odds were that the Titans were nearby, and they had just taken her here for some reason. That logic and an inexplicable feeling of safety convinced her. Just then the light from the hallway was obstructed by a figure dressed in all black. She couldn't make out his face from her position, her head propped up by pillows. He leaned against the doorframe.

"Hey." His voice sounded strange: muffled, low and somehow tinny. She recognized it instantly, and tensed. She was completely immobile and powerless, and stuck in a room with Red X. He ambled over to her, and she desperately tried to run, to sit up, to do anything but stay still as he advanced. She was straining to push herself up into a sitting position when he reached her. He gently placed a hand on her upper chest, and held her down. "Don't try to move." She didn't. She substituted her fear and confusion for a coy, curious expression. His breath hitched under the mask, and he had to breathe slowly in and out for a few seconds. She looked at him innocently. He removed his hand, and straightened up. "It gets hard to breathe under that mask sometimes," he said in explanation.

"So, take it off," she suggested. He hesitated for a moment, then reached for the nape of his own neck, and pulled it off, starting from the back. Raven gasped quickly and almost inaudibly. Whatever she had been expecting, it wasn't this. Red X was undeniably handsome. His longish black hair stuck out in every direction, like Robin's before he gelled it. He had big startlingly blue eyes, and no facial hair. He grinned, revealing classically straight, white teeth that had probably never needed braces.

It should be stated at this point that most people are afraid of nothing more than they are of the unknown. Raven was not entirely like this. She knew what she had to fear, and had from a young age. No imagined monster could be scarier. That was why Beast Boy's horror movies had never particularly scared her. You were never allowed to fully understand the monster. Raven rarely found anything scary, or any sort of threat, until she could tell, at least somewhat, what it was capable of. So Red X taking off his mask didn't relieve her in the slightest. It told her, to some extent, just what he was capable of. First, his age. He was capable of what every teenage boy was capable of. Such things need no further explanation. The other important thing about teenagers is that they have learned how to learn, and they can improve and grow in their skills and abilities very well through conscious effort. She knew Red X to be capable of being heartless and a selfish thief, and able to steal from Robin's private vault in Titan's tower. In these things he had probably improved, and would still probably improve. Not a good sign. His blue eyes told her something else she didn't want to know: he was perfectly capable of seducing her.

"Who are you?" she questioned. His grin widened.

"Just a kid smart enough to find this suit, and dumb enough to take it for a joyride."

She frowned. He walked to the window, and looked out of it thoughtfully. He turned briskly, and began walking over to her again.

Raven tried again to sit up, instinctively, as he advanced. This time, Red X again placed a hand just below her neck on her collarbone, but he also leaned in so that his face was inches from her own. His floppy black hair tickled her forehead. She doubted she had the energy even to reach out her tongue to his face (some attack that would have been!), but she did manage to scowl, her face almost relaxing into the expression, natural as it was to her. His demeanor immediately lightened as hers darkened. He grinned at her scowl, and breathed teasingly on her.

"Like us being this close, Raven? Now that you're here, I can be as forward as I want."

Raven spoke icily. "Oh yeah? I thought you were after Starfire, you bastard. Let me go!"

He laughed gently. "No, Starfire doesn't interest me at all. I just say that to piss off Robin. You, however? You have always interested me. As for letting you go, you are, of course, free to go. Go ahead, sit up now; I'll catch you." He smiled again, his pearly white teeth gleaming down at her.

She growled. "If you try anything, I swear I'll..."

"You'll what? Fiercely bat your eyelashes at me?" He lifted his hand. She did not try again to sit up.

"I'll wipe that idiotic grin off your face!"

He immediately gave her a full blown pouty face, lower lip out and all. He had moved his head back and it was no longer quite as close to her face. "But I wike my smile!" he whined. She suppressed a grin.

"Deal with it." His smile returned. She darkened. "How the hell did I get here and what'd you tell the Titans?" she asked, finally getting down to business.

He frowned. "You don't remember?"

Raven's eyes flashed. "Well, you obviously drugged me before taking me here. I can't move at all..." Her eyes widened suddenly. "You didn't hurt any of the rest of them, did you?"

He looked astonished, his light mood disappearing like water down a drain. "What! No way! I saved you; I didn't do any of that stuff!"

She narrowed her eyes, her mouth slightly open in uncertainty. "Sure...right." Red X had obviously drugged her, otherwise she'd be kicking his butt right now. So why did he deny it? She's always found him to be very confidant of himself, if not slightly arrogant, so by all rights he should be bragging about the deed: pulling Raven out from under Robin's wing (so to speak) and Cyborg's security system was no mean feat. How had he managed it? Her most recent memories were blurred, from the drug, no doubt, so she could get little clues from them. And yet... he had seemed so sincere when he denied her accusations. Had seemed offended by them, even.

He looked concerned. "What's the last thing you remember?"

She thought, and the repressed memories crept slowly back to her. "I was out walking in the city at night away from Titan Tower. It was dark. A woman was yelling 'Help! I've been robbed!' and I ran towards the voice. The next part is...fuzzier. I remember being hit in the neck with something, and seeing a figure in black pointing a gun at me. That would be you." she clarified. He frowned. Of course, this wasn't quite the last thing she remembered, but that she would keep to herself to see if it matched with his story. It might as well; it was certainly too far-fetched and unprecedented to be true.

"That wasn't me."

"Sure."

"It wasn't. I saw him too. I saw you fall after getting hit from a dart from his gun. I called out to you, and he ran. The lady at the store that he'd just robbed rushed back inside when I came swooping over, and I saw that you were hurt. You looked awake. Your eyes were still slightly open..."

Raven remembered the next part. It had been what she'd kept from him, and what she hadn't dared believe was more than a dream, because it had felt so unreal. Red X had knelt down beside her. She was scared, scared for once in her life. She had never liked the people that crowded the city at night, and she was afraid of the man in black now approaching her, thinking him to be the man who had shot at her with his gun. Her vision had blurred, and she saw Red X's mask as a floating skull. She had gasped, and he gently put his hand on her arm. "Hold on," he had whispered. She'd squeezed her eyes shut, blocking out the skull and focusing on the soothing voice that sounded so much like Robin's. "You'll be alright, don't worry." She remembered feeling the sensation of being lifted up, then a sudden, intense cold, and finally...nothing.

"You...saved...me...?" she said slowly, getting used to the feel of such strange words on her tongue.

"Yeah." he nodded solemnly. "That's what I've been trying to tell you. I saw that you were hurt, and brought you over here, to my humble home. I put you on my bed to rest, and researched on the internet the dart that I'd pulled from your neck." She shuddered unconsciously. "Don't worry. It saps energy--a new, longer-lasting sort of an instant knockout drug--but doesn't have any long term implications. The victim regains their strength over several days, and then they have fully recovered, all my sources confirm." He smiled again, but this smile was small and shy, very different from the mocking grins he had been flashing at her earlier.

"You're a geek." she realized aloud. "Like Robin."

He face grew stormy. "I'm not like Robin!"

Her eyes widened for an instant at his reaction, then narrowed. "Fine, you're not. He's a hero, you're a villain; he's a leader, you're a coward; he's my friend, and you're...what?"

His smile returned. "I'm a different kind of friend, but a friend nonetheless."

She hesitated, and then smiled back at him. "Okay."

He nodded. "You want me to help you sit up?"

She grimaced. "Yeah, I guess." He obediently supported her into a sitting position, leaning against the backboard of his bed.

"How's that?" he asked politely.

"Okay."

"Great. Then, as your friend, I suggest you start finding out what you can manage to do. But, would you like something to eat first?"

"That would be great, actually. What can you make?"

"Anything microwaveable, in addition to cereal and spaghetti."

She laughed softly. "And what do you have?"

"Canned soup, mostly. But I can quickly acquire for you anything that will fit inside my pocket." A raised eyebrow and half-smile accompanied his offer.

She sighed. "Soup it is. Make whatever you want; between living with Starfire, who considers gelatinous masses a delicacy, Beast Boy, who eats hardly anything but tofu, and Cyborg, who would eat meat all day if he could, my taste buds are on permanent strike."

He grinned, and bowed himself out of the room to warm up the soup.

She watched him go, a slightly bemused look on her face. She did not understand at all why Red X had done what he had for her. Sure, for a ransom, for revenge, or for pure spite, she could imagine him kidnapping her, as he had done in some sense of the word. But kidnapping involves a dominating authority, and Red X was not trying to establish that. He was trying, she thought, to establish something entirely different: trust.

Trust...

Trust was not something that had ever come easy for Raven. She disliked trust; distrusted trust, even. It was a weakness. Most people will betray you eventually, depending on the price. Robin, Starfire, Beast Boy, and Cyborg had all earned her trust time and time again, proving themselves loyal, dedicated friends. And yet...she would not be completely surprised if they abandoned her at any time. She was the creepy one, the dark one... each Titan had unique traits, but as far as personality went, she would always be the odd man out. They would never understand. She couldn't blame them. After all--

"Raven?"

She started, her heart rate accelerating. A figure entered, carefully balancing a tray in his gloved hands. Red X. She relaxed, the irony of Red X's presence being reassuring not escaping her.

"Hey," she said casually, expertly keeping the emotions of seeing him again out of her voice.

He set down the tray on the table beside her bed, and sat down himself at the foot of the bed. "Are you okay?"

She skewered him with a look. "Yes. Why?"

He didn't back down. "Your voice sounds a bit...tense."

What? How could he tell!? She had controlled it, she always controlled it! It had sounded almost exactly like anything else she had ever said.

Almost.

She swallowed soundlessly. "How could you tell?"

He smiled very slightly, his blue eyes still looking a bit worried. "I'm a thief. I notice everything in my environment or I get caught."

"Oh really."

"Yup. Sorry I scared you, at any rate."

She nodded, unnerved by his level of perception. Had the Titans so grossly underestimated Red X? After all, she had never formally met him, and yet he could read her like a book. She silently pondered as he set the tray down on the bedside table. He seemed just as content as she with the silence, and he sat down on the bed, staring again out the window with his big blue eyes. She watched him, her mind racing. When her mouth finally formed a question, it was nothing she had been planning to ask. "Why'd you take off your mask?"

He turned his head to face her, his blue eyes piercing. He blinked, hesitated, and then awkwardly strung together a coherent sentence or two. "Well...I thought...you were here, stuck with me, and there's nothing you could do about it. I'm forcing you to trust me. I figured I might trust you a bit in return."

She smiled at him, understanding perfectly. He smiled sadly.

"Y'know...I was wrong." Red X stared out the window again. "Robin and I...we do have our similarities."

She sighed. "I know. I mean... I've noticed."

"Yeah." he said, glancing quickly at her, and then facing back at the window. "I don't like to admit them, and I know that Robin would deny it entirely, but... we're almost mirror images of each other in some ways."

She too turned to the window, trying to understand Red X's enigmatic behavior. The day--it was day now, and she hadn't asked how long she had been out--was gray and dreary, raindrops falling methodically to their doom like soldiers. She wondered idly what her fellow Titans were doing as a comfortable silence settled between the two teens, both lost in thought as they watched the rain.

BIIIIIIP! BIIIIIIP! BIIIIIIP!

Raven winced at the sound of the alarm, while Red X scowled and jumped up, darting out the door. Raven turned to where he'd gone, a raised eyebrow declaring her mild surprise. He popped back in for a moment, his now serious blue eyes trained on Raven. "Please excuse me." He pulled on his mask and was gone.

She sighed, still unable to move, psychic powers still beyond her grasp. She felt so helpless sitting there, in that unknown place, the door slightly open, who-knows-what lurking behind it. And what had that alarm been about? At Titan Tower an alarm meant trouble, someone who needed their help. Where X lived, it probably indicated an opportunity to cause trouble, something that needed stealing. She frowned.

Red X was in his element. Adrenaline coursed through his body as he darted up the stairs three at a time, making his way up to the roof. The alarm HAD meant trouble---for him. It went off whenever the Teen Titans were in the area. His machines recognized the frequency that the Titan communicators operated on, and set off an alarm when the signal got too clear. The volume of the alarm indicated just how close the vigilantes were, so Red X recognized that today, the problem was urgent. He wondered how they had found him.

Robin perched on a rooftop silently, scouting the area as the cold rain slowly numbed his skin. The Titans had been searching for Raven for hours, ever since they had noticed her missing from her room that morning. Beast Boy had left without so much as a tofu waffle, and, knowing Beast Boy's stomach, that was saying something. They had split up, naturally, to cover the most distance. Robin had gone to the eastern part of town, furthest from Titan Tower, while Starfire went north, Cyborg went south, and Beast Boy stayed by the west coast, closest to the Tower, to dig up clues. Of course, they communicated any results with each other through their communicators. Why wouldn't they? So when BB reported that Raven's scent disappeared entirely in a very bad part of town with a single drop of her own blood found on the dirty street, they were all worried, Robin most of all. After all, there aren't very many ways a person can disappear without a trace, and one of them he had perfected himself. Teleportation. Impossible without the Red X suit, but with it, very possible indeed. Could it be?

Had Red X taken Raven?

He couldn't know for sure until he found one of them. It was at that exceedingly opportune moment that his communicator beeped, displaying a symbol moving on a grid of green intersecting lines. A very appropriate symbol, given the circumstances. A red "X." This meant that it had detected a xenothium source in the area. X. Robin gritted his teeth, and cracked his knuckles. Time to get down to business.

Red X wanted to buy some time before Robin found his hideout. Yes, he knew that the Titan who had set off his alarms was Robin. It was obvious, really. He had called several of his contacts to see if they had seen or heard anything suspicious, and they hadn't. That ruled out the other three titans immediately. Beast Boy was green, Starfire was orange, and Cyborg, well, just liked blasting things too much for his own good. So if another Titan was in the area besides Raven, it had to be Robin, Mr. Inconspicuous himself.

He glanced at the highly modified wristwatch that he had strapped on over his suit as a drop of rain rolled down its screen. One of its personally built in features was the "Titan Tracker," which picked up the location of any broadcasting or receiving Titan communicator in range. The big plus to this worked around a flaw in the communicators' design. They located one another using the tracking devices built into each one, and could not communicate if a tracker was disabled. So by disabling the tracker in Raven's communicator and leaving other functions intact, Red X could monitor her communicator's location while leaving it invisible to Robin and the others. They could not even communicate with it, since they could not find it, although its receiving functions were fully intact. Red X grinned gloatingly. The Titans were lucky that he didn't have greater ambitions than stealing a priceless gem here or there, or the world wouldn't stand a chance against the genius of the great Red X.

Without further ado, he took off after the blinking red dot that was Robin.

---

Robin ducked into a cutesy Hallmark shop for a moment to get out of the chilling shower outside. The blond cashier gave him a startled look and Robin ignored her, shivering. His gaze was fixed on the world outside of the cheerful display window, a darker, harsher world with fewer puppies and more kidnappings. Somewhere out there was his friend and teammate, probably alone, helpless, and hurt. And all thanks to Red X, it seemed.

Robin's chase after Red X had been strange. He would follow the moving symbol for several minutes, then X would teleport, ending up very close to Robin, but before Robin could find him, he'd teleport off again, now in an entirely new direction. This pattern repeated several times, until Robin couldn't help but think that X was leading him off on some strange cat-and-mouse chase. But how could that be? X had no way of knowing where Robin was, did he?

Suddenly the "X" on his communicator's map was right next to the icon that marked his own location, so close that the two symbols overlapped. Robin cursed and the woman behind him let out a little gasp. He didn't even turn around to look at her, his eyes instead sweeping across the street outside of the shop, trying to spot the elusive thief. He unwittingly glimpsed the woman briefly in the reflection on the window's glass, and suddenly knew why she had gasped. He spun around. Red X stood behind the woman--the sole occupant of the shop other than the two masked men--one gloved hand held firmly over her mouth. At Robin's sudden movement, X let go of her, roughly pushing her aside as he stepped towards the superhero. "Hey birdboy. Lose something?" he taunted. Robin merely growled, launching himself at X. Strangely, X did not jump into a defensive position, but instead took Robin head on, grabbing him. Robin pushed against X, trying to knock him away, but Red X lifted a hand up to Robin's head, one finger pressing a button on his inner wrist. Red gas emptied out from its hidden chamber, and as Robin breathed it in, he fell limply against X, unconscious. Red X allowed himself a second's triumphant chuckle before he buzzed out, taking Robin with him.

They reappeared in the southernmost part of town, where Cyborg was patrolling. Red X set Robin's unconscious form down on a street corner and jumped back into the shadows. A moment later, Cyborg came barreling down the street, and saw Robin. He approached warily. "Oh no..."

X teleported, knowing that the Titans would temporarily postpone the search to take care of their leader, and that Robin would be very, very annoyed when he woke up in a few hours. That meant that for the moment, he and Raven were safe. He smiled in satisfaction, and reappeared on the roof of his apartment building still smiling. But unfortunately for X, Robin was not so easily defeated. The poor thief; he had no idea what he was about to be in for.


	2. Chapter 2

Hooray for chapter 2! Yes, I know it's shorter and potentially less awesome than chapter 1, but then again, there wasn't even gonna be a chapter two until inspiration came in the form of seven lovely reviews. So this chapter's dedicated to NightRaven511, NinjaBunnyOverlord, Poison's Ivy, DataX, lilac gurl, Lovina Holmes, and lamia-amo. Oh yeah...apologies for the blatant fluff.

---------

Robin did not wake up in a good mood. The knockout drug had left him with a blinding headache and, after a few seconds of blinking the pulsating pain behind his eyelids into submission, he was hit with a realization even more painful. He had failed. Raven with still out there somewhere, and X had done something to her so severe that he didn't dare even risk his usual banter with Robin. He just knocked the Boy Wonder out and made his escape. Not like the Red X they knew at all. Robin was worried.

He let out a frustrated sigh, and Beast Boy jumped up from his slouched nap in the chair by Robin's infirmary bed. "Dude! You okay? Cy found you, man, and we had no idea what hap"  
Robin silenced him with a hand held out and spoke urgently, "How long was I out, and where are the others?"

Beast Boy blinked. Well, Robin certainly didn't waste any time getting back to business. "Cy and Starfire are both out looking for Raven, still. Star's flying and Cy said he was working on a xeno-whatsit detector thingy."

"A xenothium detector expedient ray. He shouldn't have bothered. I've got one and it was no help." Robin sighed again and ran a hand through his hair. "Call Cyborg up here, would you? I need his help with something."

Beast Boy nodded obediently, and left.

Twenty minutes later Robin and Cyborg were sitting side by side, tinkering with a spare Titan communicator. Robin had explained how X seemed to have known his position, and Cyborg was convinced that the thief had found some way of picking up the frequencies the Titan's communicators tuned to. He was eagerly working out a way around that problem. The communicator and a regular cell phone were both opened up, spilling their electrical guts all over the table. Various wires and chips littered the table as well, and Cyborg was gingerly soldering a chip into place inside the cell phone. A moment later he retracted the mini blowtorch back into his mechanical arm and grinned at Robin. "All ready"  
Robin didn't smile back, just nodded grimly. X was about to learn a lesson about tricking the leader of the Teen Titans, and Robin was ready to teach it to him. ----

Back at X's apartment, Raven was experimenting. Her strength was far from returned, but she found that if she really concentrated, she could levitate small objects. REALLY small objects. Her greatest achievement so far was with a paper clip. Every few minutes she would glance again at the half-open door, as if expecting someone at any moment to join her for a nice cup of tea. And at one very opportune moment, someone did. It was Red X, of course, panting slightly but looking pleased.

"So, where were you?" she asked, hiding the curiosity and concern in her voice with its usual monotone.

He grinned. "Fighting truth and justice."

"Fighting FOR truth and justice, you mean," she supplied, and he shook his head, and once more pulled off the mask.

"Nope. Fighting Robin. Or rather, getting him off my- or our tail." He laughed, a light fleeting sound, and perched himself on the edge of the bed, watching her. "Powers coming back at all?"

She responded by sending the aforementioned paper clip at his head, and he instinctively reached out a gloved hand and caught it in midair. "Nice. What did I tell you; you'll be better in no time."

She nodded. "Still one thing I don't understand, though."

"And what's that?"

"You. You saving me. You didn't have any obligation toward me at all...in fact, I'm one of your worst enemies. You should have been happy to see my unconscious there. Another threat down. Or you could have used me as a bribe for something...gotten the other Titans off your back in return for me kept safe. If you were feeling particularly charitable, you could have called the police or the Titans as an anonymous witness and let them try to help me themselves. But instead you actually took me in, to your own apartment, and let me recover in your own bed. I don't see your motivation."

"Who says I won't use you as a bribe still?" He cocked an eyebrow.

"You did. You called yourself my friend. And, remember, I can hear the timbre of your thoughts...it's surprisingly less diabolical than I would have thought."

"I try to keep my diabolical side buried in the subconscious for that exact purpose."

"I'm sure you do. But you're avoiding the question."

"Why does it matter? I did what I did, and that doesn't change who I am, and what that means to you. I'm a thief, you're a vigilante. It's your job to ruin my life. And mine to complicate yours."

"Well, you are certainly doing a fine job of that."

He scooted over to the space next to her, and put an arm casually around her neck. "Am I?" he questioned innocently, his head turned down to her, an amused look on his face. She automatically leaned her head against his warm, comforting shoulder, and closed her eyes. "Yeah...I think you are..."

X smiled smugly as Raven relaxed against him, and slowly fell into slumber. He wasn't surprised, after the things through in the last few hours, that she'd want to rest. Looking down at the sleeping girl, he absentmindedly stroked her violet hair, lost in thought. Why had he saved her? Even in the heat of the moment he'd felt a nagging feeling that what he was doing was wrong. Selfish, heartless thieves do not help others, particularly others that want to get said thieves thrown in jail. It went against everything he had become, everything the Red X suit had made him. He sighed as his hand traveled, feather-light, down her jawline, his thumb brushing over her soft lips before he snapped out of his musings and daydreams.

X reluctantly withdrew his arm and slid her off his shoulder and back against the pillow. As much as he liked having the half-demon girl asleep in his arms, he had things to do. And places to be. He didn't expect Robin to waste much time before coming after him again, especially now that he had a good reason to suspect X.

He quickly scrawled a note--"Raven. Out birdwatching. Back later."--and left again, this time pausing, if only for a moment, to look back at what he was leaving behind.


End file.
